Police will focus on fabric found during search for toddler Needham
POLICE searching for missing child Ben Needham have found information of “slight interest” – including fabric – following an initial excavation on the Greek island of Kos.
A 19-strong team of South Yorkshire Police officers, forensic specialists and an archaeologist have been scouring an arid stretch of farmland where 21-monthold Ben was playing 25 years ago.
Teams with diggers this week made a fresh excavation at the site following new evidence Ben may have been killed and buried there by a digger.
It is yards from where he vanished while his grandfather was renovating a property.
Detective Inspector Jon Cousins said: We found a vast number of bones yesterday. Each one was examined immediately, and each one was discounted there and then as being an animal bone.
“There are some other items that are of slight interest – the odd piece of fabric. That is being analysed and looked at, but there is slight interest.
“Everything is being carefully looked at.”
He added: “We want to make sure: do they or do they not relate to any of the items Ben was wearing on that day?”
The toddler was wearing a white and green shirt and a pair of leather sandals on the day he went missing, July 24, 1991.
The items have been forensically collected and photographs sent to colleagues back in the UK before a decision is made on whether they require further examination and testing.
Mr Cousins, the senior investigating officer, said: “We got ahead of time, which meant we got digging a little bit earlier than I expected.
“So far it is going better than to plan.”
Searches of the site are expected to last for at least a week.